Bittersweet
by domino.dice
Summary: Getting the short end of the stick yet again, House is believed to have a more serious problem when other syptoms are revealed five years after the initial infarction. Wilson's uncertain when it's decided House is to be placed in his care. 1st ch revised
1. Innuo Primordium

Spoilers for... um... the first season?

Alright... I realized I needed to change it so it could actually maybe take place... so I added Stacy content into the first chapter. . I ended up re-doing most of Wilson's little inner monologue at the beginning for some reason because of it, and somehow the fateful meeting was inserted as well. It got... long on me. It used to be four paragraphs, the last one being puny, and composed of two sentences.

_Bittersweet_

INNUO PRIMORDIUM

The day was clear and free, in as many ways as a day could be- there wasn't a single cloud in the sky, the only appointment he had that day had canceled, and the other patients in the oncology ward were tended to by the nurses and orderlies, no emergencies, no scheduled surgeries, no wisps in the blue hinting at any foul weather, and just the slightest wind to offset the sun, making the day light, and perfectly tepid. Just about the worst thing he expected was that princely Greg House would be in a different bad mood that he wasn't nearly so familiar with, but the chances of that were unlikely. House's personality rarely changed with the weather, though he was probably less likely to leave his office when everyone was happy with the sunshine. Judging by the number of people in the food court, Wilson assumed that patient volume was relatively low all around the hospital.

Either that or all the mobility-able ones chose to stay inside and chew on the tiny slice of heaven they got through the window; hopefully not for the same reason as House. It didn't matter that much, fewer people was nice. So nice that Wilson had spent the majority of the afternoon out in the sun with a coffee and several rounds of muffins. He secretly hoped that his friend diagnostician would happen by for a rigorous afternoon talking to, though, but the hope was never realized. In fact, he'd seen no one from House's chosen troupe yet that day. There had to be some secret reason for not enjoying the sun, but Wilson wasn't yet interested enough to find out.

Perfectly content was he, simply doing nothing for once. Maybe if things stayed constant with this he could blackmail House away from his soaps and miniature game console to really do nothing for a while. Wilson was convinced it would do him a world of good, even if he refused to admit it; he'd seemed just a little more on edge the past few weeks, and between the rash of bland cases and hypochondriacs, and the forced clinic duty, he was probably suffering from a psychological repetitive stress syndrome. A headache, to say the least. Another, possibly unrelated headache was that Stacy Warner, one of the only women who'd ever managed to be the object of House's affections, was in the process of transferring to Princeton-Plainsboro Teaching Hospital. The headache there was that she'd been wed to someone who was not House three years earlier, not terribly long after their breakup. It was one of the two hardest things he'd ever seen House go through, though even the events surrounding the infarction in his leg may have been second to it.

House had always been closed and strictly mistrusting even before those events, though Wilson stood by him throughout. He'd known since he secured his job at the hospital that he was still only human, though he pretended not to be for the above mentioned and other private reasons. Wilson had long since become immune to the scathe, and had grown to depend on it; it wasn't just about being defensive, it was just who he was. He was something of an acquired taste- he was stubborn, willing and able to take advantage of any opening anyone wasn't careful enough to close, adverse to accepting anything less than perfection especially from himself, yet at the same time managing to expect nothing but the worst from people. Most saw only his misanthropy but he very much intended it that way, for pity was not something he relished and rudeness was an excellent way to put people off. He didn't really hate people, just the stupid things they did and as such it was difficult for him to trust in general. Wilson understood that no one knew House as well as he did and few bothered to even try, though House didn't exactly make it easy. His first encounters with House were certainly quite singular because of the man's attitude.

They'd first met with a bang, and quite literally so. It wasn't more than a few months after the disappearance of Wilson's brother, and his first young wife Emily had presented him with divorce papers. They'd been together since high school, and she'd always known he wanted to be a doctor, but never really thought much about it until his first real position at Princeton-Plainsboro Teaching Hospital and they started seeing significantly less of each other. Needless to say, Wilson's mind had been elsewhere as he crossed the parkade exit to the bike rack. Maybe it happened because House had a tendency of going radical speeds on familiar roads, or maybe the sun was in his eyes, but it was slightly too late when he saw the distracted doctor ahead of him, but managed to get slow enough before hitting him to knock him onto his butt on the curb and cause no serious damage.

House jumped from his car, already suggesting a settlement price while at the same time making sure he didn't need to fetch anyone from inside but was satisfied that he didn't need to after only several moments. Wilson just stood, trying to convince House, who was no stranger to lawsuits even then, that he wasn't going to take him to court. House, naturally, had been quite surprised, but got back in his car, saying that they should do it again some time. How exactly that led to their friendship was never quite clear, but it somehow triggered a karmic series of running each other over with things. It happened all over the hospital, and they'd never recalled running into each other before the car incident. They'd knock trays in the cafeteria; a trolly manned by a nurse accompanying Wilson met House's toes later in the week; retaliation came in the form of junk-filled boxes when House changed offices. By far the best encounter since the principle was when Wilson crashed a patient into him while rounding a corner, and amused the girl en route to an MRI with their 'discussion' that followed.

This continued for several weeks, and they ended up nearly colliding again at the same site of the introduction. Both happened to stay late to finish some work, both coincidentally deciding to turn in for the night at the same time, and barely escaped a somewhat more serious encounter as Wilson swerved just in time while crossing the parkade exit on his bike. That time around, House simply rolled down the window and leaned out and informed him that he'd be required by law to turn to the police if there was another attempt at a murder-suicide. Wilson in turn suggested that maybe they should work it out over coffee some day, his treat.

And so Wilson became the only person man enough to call him friend, and while Stacy came to care for him deeply as well, she was a different story. House's appeal came in a disguised form, and took a little talent and a lot of tolerance to uncover. He shamelessly matched wits with the best of them like nobody's business, there was dedication, purpose, and the drive of a madman, possessing a mysterious need for redemption. Though he approached patients and cases more objectively, as though they were a problem to be solved and not a person to be guided through their troubles, again it didn't matter. There were always psychologists for later, who were far more likely to receive patients if they were alive, thanks to the even-handed method. Far more sensible than to care about a person's feelings, cloud your own judgment, and in the events following, miss something and have less or none of that patient around to treat later.

Wilson was interrupted out of his musings by the sound of his pager, ringing a pleasant tone as it vibrated against his empty mug. He sighed more out of habit than anything else, took up his pager, and left the sunlight behind.

oOo

It turned out to be a fairly pointless excursion back into the building; his appointment from earlier in the day decided to come back and take up thirty minutes worth of potential sun-and-muffin time. He was a post operative patient, having had a successful surgery four months prior, but everyone has their worries. Wilson made more of a habit of putting the patient's mind at ease than House did, but still he had to admit to himself that House was the better doctor if social interactions were taken out of the equation. It was an appointment that could have waited a few hours until the sun wasn't quite so inviting, but it gave him an excuse to harmlessly place himself in front of House's office.

Walking by, though, the office demanded a little more of his attention than a fly-by. The glass walls and doors left nothing to the imagination- the blinds were drawn and, though it wasn't unusual for House to do so to see his various electronic entertainment devices better, the lights were also down and House looked quite asleep draped back over his chair. All said devices off for the time being but for the generic screen saver on the computer. Few people ventured into that sort of territory, but Wilson had his House-sharpened wit about him, and had the added bonus of being his closest friend.

Preparing his wake-up call, he entered and approached...

'Unless you have cookies and assorted wilderness survival badges you should seriously reconsider your presence on my doorstep...'

Wilson's well-thought out strategy fell from his mind at the sound of the bleary but still no less amusing words of his colleague. 'Even Garfield sleeps in the sun. What's your excuse?' He said instead.

'I resent that implication.' He paused before giving a straight answer in a noticeably more sullen tone. 'Headache.'

'And your vicious powers of making people feel moderately affronted have been compensated likewise.'

'I don't see the badges, but I'd better see some cookies here soon. The small blunt objects in arms reach are varied and numerous.' Despite the spent tone, he did put sincerity behind his words.

_Great,_ thought Wilson. _The universe balances out my day with the off-chance that he'd have a funky mood._

Not enough people could tell the difference between House's usual hard-done-by front, and genuine aggravation, though fortunately Wilson was one of them. He decided to probe, but in a somewhat quieter voice. 'Not surprising considering the circus you've been getting through here. I take it you haven't see much of Stacy?'

House shrugged. 'Either she's avoiding me, or I'm avoiding her. I haven't decided yet.'

'That's the optimal way of dealing with the situation.' Wilson said, casting a sigh to the ceiling.

'It's working for me now, but I expect that's going to change as soon as you get me in touch with my inner Wilson.'

Wilson shook his head a little with a small smile. House did look fairly tired though. It was a given that House was easily bored, but he disliked anything like sympathy, and tried not to show anything that might make anyone actually worry. He felt he could deal with it easily enough on his own, but there were two problems- the first being that he'd never taken psychology like most college and university students, the second being he actually could most of the time. Right then, it was of course entirely possible that he'd taken several more pills because of the potential stress that Stacy presented, and the present factor of a headache. Just to be sure though... 'You took Vicodin for the headache?' Wilson tried to ward his tone by sounding just a touch casual.

'Seeing as I happen to be on a strict diet of 'no other painkillers' I figured it was fair game.'

'Fine, just don't fall asleep on me then.' He'd long since gotten used to House's painkiller issues, and the fact that he admitted it to himself, but no one else even though virtually everyone knew anyhow. There was no use fighting about it, especially since Vicodin really couldn't be taken in tangent with other standard painkillers, and though House's personality didn't have a direct relationship to the weather, it did to his pain. He grew exponentially more stubborn and cranky the more pain he was in, which meant that this headache must have been a doozy.

The Vicodin had always been a cause for concern. Taking them for his physical pain wasn't any big issue, that's what they were prescribed for, but House also seemed to take them when a stressful situation presented itself which was a clear sign of addiction. Months ago, after House's little bet with Cuddy, he did finally and reluctantly admit to the issue, but since then it hadn't been revisited or otherwise addressed. He did his job fine while taking them, though with satire, and everyone turned a blind eye to it once more. The Vicodin was to House as cocaine was to Sherlock Holmes and somehow, though it was somewhat of an ugly thing, it worked.

Just then a quite plain thought occurred to Wilson, that had no excuse for not showing itself sooner. 'You haven't taken your vacation yet-'

'Oh, here we go.' House said with unnecessary drama, sitting up and grabbing his cane from his desk. 'They put you up to this and didn't even give you any cookies to deliver to soften the blow?'

Wilson raised a brow at his friend. 'No, actually am taking my own risks this time... and what's with re-using the cookie bit?'

'Chalk it up to migraine-induced lameness and a beautifully choreographed Mr. Christie commercial...' He stood and made his way to the door.

'Two weeks without work for a two week's supply of cookies.'

'Now who's re-using the cookie bit?'

'You started it.'

'You couldn't afford all the cookies I'd eat in two weeks. Besides, vacation when there's plenty of rounds of listening to people who pretend to be their own doctors to make? Actually, I think I even learned something new this week.' House said, sounding thoroughly enlightened. Wilson strolled by him as they passed through the halls.

'Heaven forbid... you listened to a patient, who mustered the nerve to speak up in your presence?'

'Yes,' House said firmly. 'He even brought a pretty med encyclopedia with him. I can honestly say that, before I met him, I never knew you could buy one so decent for twenty-eight dollars and seventy cents. I could have gotten me one of them with the money I earned while he convinced himself that I gave a damn.'

'Twice the anger, half the wit,' Wilson noted. He was getting the vague notion that something was amiss; it was more a sixth sense than anything else, since usually there were no outright signs the other times he had felt this way. Usually he found out later that it was some personal issue, the loss of a patient for instance, that he allegedly wasn't letting bother him. There had been no urgent cases recently for him to dwell on, so the alert had to mean something else. Though there was some emotional turmoil hidden away in the back closet of House's mind, Wilson had already identified that. There was something else... He wasn't sure how he could tell these things about him, but such suspicions were rarely nothing. He couldn't fathom what it might have been this time, so he packaged it away for when more details presented themselves.

'Where are you going, anyway?' Wilson noticed that they'd been winding through the halls with no particular heed to direction.

'I memorized Cuddy's schedule during this dry spell. She's only one step behind me though, she's beginning to anticipate my anticipations of her activities. So far I've been able to look busy enough to avoid even more boring clinic cases.'

'Exactly why you take your vacation now.' Wilson reasoned. 'I'm sure people will come up with more creative afflictions in two weeks. Everyone's inspiration is occupied. It is spring, after all, when a young man's fancy turns to-'

'Cuddy.'

'Not what I had in mind, but you at least understand why she always seems to be missing her top button...'

House rapped Wilson smartly in the shin with his cane, most subtly drawing his attention to the hallway ahead of them. 'If she asks any awkward questions, the story is you were feeling the need to frighten the people in the smoking pit.'

'And you're coming with me because...?'

'If you look real cute and tell her it was because you didn't wanna be all alone when you faced the three-hundred-twenty-pound smokers, I'm sure she'd cut you some slack. You're irresistible when you pretend to be harmless.'

'Greg... I'm sorry, I just don't see you in that way.'

'House,' Cuddy called from down the hall, with all the pleasant pretense of a murder of crows.

'Just act natural.' House said with a definitive nod, clearly thinking he had it under control.

This time around, Cuddy seemed careful when she crossed her arms in disapproval, attempting to shield her blouse from inappropriate criticism. 'Up to no good and making off with one of the more decent ones.'

'Ooh, tricky one... the first one makes me think Sugarland down in Mississippi, but...'

Cuddy smiled her classic satiric smile, usually administered to those who were about to receive some humiliating fate, which for House was usually... 'Clinic duty. You've been due for days, but somehow you manage to occupy yourself with other doctor's patients enough to slip right by, but seeing as you're not busy now, I think it's most opportune.'

'Darn. I told you we should have taken those nurse's uniforms.' Sounding quite disappointed, he gave Wilson a pointed look.

'Ha. Just what appointment are you off to now?' She looked between the two of them, the superior glare of a mother who knows which of her sons broke the new vase. Wilson was shot a particularly threatening 'stick-with-the-story' look from House, but he felt he already knew exactly what to say.

'Just off looking for you, actually. In such a dull time as this, you don't really need an expert diagnostician. House was hoping for his vacation, weren't you?' The look he received then triggered a strange reaction, lighting up a star inside of him. It was an urgent star, but he couldn't tell exactly what it meant... except that, boy was he going to get heck later. It'd be for the better, in the end. Wilson really couldn't see what the problem was this time, a vacation was a perfectly legitimate reason to escape working in the clinic for a solid two weeks without having to avoid anyone.

Without missing a beat, Cuddy replied, 'Clinic first.'

The star was burning brightly now, enough to understand the gist of it's urgency; Cuddy would end up giving House extra clinic hours, no doubt, before his freedom, so he wasn't going to be let off so easily. One might have considered it fair, taking into account the various legal ways House liked to harass his superior, but anything House saw as unfair would make life for whoever inflicted the hardship significantly more stressed, and in turn, they'd retaliate. It was a complete and constant circle of annoyance.

Maybe it should be called the full House circle?

Wilson smiled inwardly at his stupid pun, and focused back on the matter at hand. House knew he was trapped now, an maybe because his headache persisted, he didn't say anything else on the matter and stalked off to the clinic, Wilson trailing behind.

'You had me hooped, and now you're going to gloat, is that it?' He was walking at a fairly agitated pace, and though it wasn't unusual for House to be rather upset about being stuck in the clinic, once again Wilson couldn't help but think that he seemed to be behaving a little more misanthropic than usual, and with a decreased amount of amusement.

He silently added a few more notes to the file in the back of his mind, and moved on. 'I've been watching people outside all day, maybe I should give the indoors a shot, and the best place for that is, naturally, the clinic.'

House remained sullenly silent. It was easy enough to pass off as simply stress. There was the ever-near pressure of dealing with Stacy on a daily basis. Because it hadn't happened yet, time continued to mature the old pains associated with her. All that aside, House and his team had been taking on the most difficult cases near-constantly, and the diagnostician's methods, while ultimately curing the patient involved, caused the patient and family members a great deal of grief, and they gladly returned the favor. House wasn't invincible, he just pretended he was, and somewhere there had to be a jar of bottled distress that was just about full. Currently, a slight overdose of Vicodin contributed to the dulling of his wit, the headache to his temper, and Stacy to his slight abdication. The lull in complicated cases was more likely to let a person's mind wander especially to the less pleasant happenings, but Wilson knew his friend well. There was something else wrong besides that, maybe something House himself wasn't yet aware of.

However, that didn't dampen his anticipation much. Though he just decided that clinic-watching could be a pastime, it was bound to be interesting today.


	2. Minuo

Mostly dialogue, House diagnosis power, with a sprinkling of Wilson insight. For those of you who don't know, THE FIRST CHAPTER HAS BEEN SERIOUSLY REVISED, so I suggest you take a look. You'd better start reviewing, I see the hits. 

MINUO

House stared at the patient from where he stood at the door. He was hoping to make it snappy, being close to the door made for a quick getaway. The patient, an older man who looked relatively fit, sat on the chair by the bed, a spiral notebook sitting on the bed itself. He rolled his left shoulder up and winced. 'It hurts when I do this,' he said.

_My god_, thought House, _it was one of those_. He sighed, taking a pill from his pocket and downing it.

'Does it hurt when I do this?' House asked, proceeding to whack the man's hand smartly with is all-purpose cane.

'Ow! Yes!' the man cried, jerking his hand away with a satisfying amount of outrage.

'Excellent. Think about that while I look at your hand.' The patient reluctantly started to offer the wounded hand, but House ignored it and took the other one, looking it over briefly. 'Are you playing or observing?'

The patient looked blankly at him.

'The public tennis couples tournament. The pamphlet's coming out of your notebook.'

'Oh... me and my wife are playing.'

House released the patient's hand. 'Firstly, that would be 'my wife and I', and secondly I assume you're taking your arthritis medication.'

'Arthritis...? What-?'

House explained in a dull tone as he stood in the doorway again. 'The pain was in your shoulder, so it was likely muscle or joint, and at your age, the latter's far more likely since you seem like the kind of man to jump around in pretty white shoes and pom-pom socks with healthy frequency. Muscle strain's ruled out; you moved your right arm with fantastic speed when my realization hit you. You're right-handed when you play tennis, aren't you?'

'Yeah-'

House snatched the prescription book from the shelf and started scribbling in it. 'Then arthritis it is. The joints on your left hand are starting to show symptoms. Take aspirin in these intervals and you're good to go for the tournament.' He flicked the paper into the patient's lap, and left the room. Outside there was only another forty minutes worth of patients, if addressed properly. Patients, patience... he really wanted to get his hands on whoever thought those two words should be in any way alike.

And his patience wouldn't last a full forty minutes with that headache.

Wilson looked up from where he was seated when a hassled-looking House exited the examination room. The hassled-looking patient left shortly after, making a b-line for the front door, eying House and clutching a prescription note. 'Always better when it's mutual.' He mused with a smile while watching discreetly for signs of House's former, slightly off mood.

House acknowledged Wilson with only scoff and turned towards the chairs of waiting people. 'You. What's wrong with you?' He said to the woman sitting closest to the examination room he was in. A pretty middle-aged brunette with her eyes closed and her head leaned back. She blinked and looked up at him.

'I... I'm sorry?' She spoke slowly with a moderately thick accent. Spanish, possibly. Interesting...

'I asked what was wrong with you in a rushed and aggravated manner. That's a hint there, so quick!'

'Sir, aren't you a patient?' She asked, beginning to get that generic, harassed look that anyone who was present when House opened his mouth had.

'I'm only disguising myself as a patient to perform a secret quality census. Bedside manner is totally the new black, and I moonlight as a culture expert. Can you tell?' He trailed off as he was met with her confusion. 'Excellent, language barrier! What's wrong with you?'

'I am dizzy...' She explained quietly, understanding enough to reply, but understanding through tone that there was no chance she could win anything with him.

Wilson himself wouldn't venture to be much else but kind to his patients. First of all, a number of them were dying, and it was hard not to be nice to someone dying of something that couldn't be helped. At least, to anyone with a conscience it would be hard. Even House put his debatable charms aside when dealing with a serious case. What he did with the others may as well have been negligible. It exasperated the patients, Cuddy and the rest of his team to no end, but his anti-tact was what made him such an excellent doctor.

'"Dee-zee"? I'll bet your travel handbook had emergency medical phrases.' He indicated the book in her lap. 'Where are you from?'

She didn't look at him and mumbled, 'Cadiz.'

'Ooh, very nice. Still a drive from being Mediterranean, but that's beside the point. The point is, this is about two thousand feet higher than your home. Sparser oxygen can be bothersome.'

House sighed as he received another dull look which flagging off the realm of her knowledge of the language. '_No es nada_, enjoy your vacation.' He waved her away and moved on as she scurried off. Under a minute. Making good time.

The next was a young couple. He was about to demand to know what the problem was when it presented itself:

Hic.

'So that's your line is it?'

'She's had them for weeks... we tried water, we tried scaring her, we tried making her hold her breath, and she even held it for a whole minute, but nothing's helped.' The young man looked slightly frantic as he pushed his glasses further up his narrow nose.

'Did you try scaring her?'

'Well... yes, I said we did...'

'But you scared her by jumping out of a box or something, right?'

'Closet, actually.'

'Well then...' House leaned in to the girl who hicced nervously, and he put on his best serious face. 'There was only one other case of serious hiccoughs on record at this hospital. Again, family members and friends tried everything, and like you, it was in vain. They brought her here to me, too, and after trying some things we had to move on to drastic measures...'

Fighting to hold back his laughter, Wilson hid behind a home and garden magazine. He knew exactly where this was going. It was clever, too. The pair of them thought it up one afternoon over lunch during one of their Outrageous Cures club sessions. The club had only ever consisted of exactly two people, but it became a bounty of obscure quips and quirks that actually worked. Hiccoughs... stimulating the sympathetic nervous system could cure them, so startling people worked sometimes. Scaring someone over a longer period of time tended to work better though...

The couple looked at House uncertainly, the girl hicced again. 'Hiccoughs are caused by spasms of a thin little muscle called the diaphragm. So naturally, the best way to stop them is to prevent the diaphragm from moving, right? Well, unfortunately we also kinda need it to breathe. Here's what we did... in a painful complicated surgical method called the Vogler method we cut her open and put little hooks into her diaphragm to hold it in place, and hooked her right on up to the heart-lung machine so she wouldn't have to breathe at all. Sadly, she didn't make it, but on the bright side, she didn't have the hiccoughs anymore. We're willing to try again, though.'

'That's totally bogus...' The guy hazarded, his face white.

'Wanna give it a try?' House asked cheerfully.

'What are you doing this time?' Came Cuddy's unimpressed voice from behind him.

'Treating patients?'

'Treating them like infants... and telling them wild fourth-grade horror-stories?'

House looked at the girl carefully. Silence. 'Yep. Case solved. Well done, Cuddy. It's a good thing you came along, your presence has done it again. I don't praise you nearly enough.'

And there it was, the cure to hiccoughs. The topic had come around in one of the briefer Outrageous Cures sessions, and making a horror story about the ailment itself seemed a perfect touch for scaring a patient enough to cure them. Vogler was a nice touch, too, though the girl wasn't able to appreciate the reference, and the name's connection to pain and complexity. In no hurry, Wilson set aside the magazine and trailed several paces behind House and Cuddy, hands in his pockets, enjoying the banter without being the victim of it.

'Who taught you that one, one of the hypochondriacs?' She moaned once they were out of earshot.

'I run on pure inspiration, in the form of cookies.'

'And Vicodin.' Cuddy suggested off-handedly. 'But you're rushing through patients again. It's not the number of patients, House, it's the number of hours.'

'I tried doing nothing in the clinic, but you won't let me.'

'And you'd let that stop you?' Wilson chimed from behind.

House continued, seeming not to have heard him. 'If there were no patients, then I could do nothing in the clinic. For as long as there were no patients. You see the logic in that? Everyone's cured, everyone wins.'

'House, your nose is bleeding.'

'What kind of a comeback is that?'

'It really is.' Cuddy sighed. 'Go see.'

Tentatively, yet still with nonchalance, he touched a hand to his nose and saw it come away tipped with red. 'Ha.' He said, sounding almost triumphant as he turned towards the clinic washroom, and paused in the doorway. 'Unfortunately, as much as I would love to finish clinic duty, no one would be able to take me seriously if I had Kleenex sticking out of my nose.' He disappeared into the washroom.

'I wager he's in there until the clinic wins a separatist motion.'

'Why are you still here?' Cuddy slumped, defeated for the moment.

Wilson was tempted to say because he was worried, but it wasn't anything strong enough to warrant voicing.

So he fell back onto House's own cover story. 'I felt the need to frighten people in the smoking pit. I need House to act as my effigy.'

'If you're actually doing this to annoy him, just tell me outright. Endeavors like that deserve flowers.'

With a smile and small shake of his head, Wilson entered the washroom leaving a cross Cuddy to her own devices. House was leaned over one of the sinks pinching his nose, his cane resting on the counter.

'That'd better not by Cuddy,' he said, head in the sink.

'She wasn't quite desperate enough to follow you into the men's washroom.' Wilson said, coming up to stand next to his friend. 'So what's with the nosebleed?'

'Dunno, but it's convenient, don't you think?'

'Not quite the word I'd have used. Have you gotten random nosebleeds before?' Wilson was plotting out exactly where he'd go with this.

'Jumping right into doctor mode. You really have had nothing to do all day, haven't you?' He straightened, pinching a paper towel on his nose which muted his voice amusingly. 'Random could mean any number of things. Air conditioning on a warm day dries out the air. Or I could have been picking my nose earlier, you never know.'

'I think you should get your blood pressure checked.' Wilson said rationally.

'Ah-ha. You're trying to convince me to take a vacation. Well, I figured out your ploy, so tough.'

Wilson leaned against the counter. Yeah, he'd been found out. It was hard to not be figured out by a man of House's intelligence. 'What exactly is wrong with taking a vacation? I've been wondering that for the last while, now.'

'That would be suggesting that I need it. Which I don't.'

'Stress, headaches, nosebleeds... your head's the only thing that doesn't want this. Come on, the vast majority of people who don't need vacations take them anyway. Long, paid vacations with girls and golf. What is it in particular that's keeping you here?'

House was quiet, and turned back to the sink. 'It's been dull enough. You should know better than anyone what that's like. Sitting in our offices, waiting for a patient, with nothing to do but watch TV, maybe play some games, or if that fails sit idly and think about cases that maybe could have been addressed differently. All of the above I can only do better at home.' He spoke plainly, and replaced his paper towel.

Well. That was a good point. Wilson's particular department hadn't been low-volume as long as House's, but he knew that during a dry spell he'd start looking back on other cases that might still be around to treat if things had gone differently. Death was always an issue for doctors, but contrary to popular belief it never got easier. Again, Wilson's sphere of duty was different in that there were always patients with poor outlooks, and there was nothing that could be done for them except make them comfortable, but the realm of diagnoses was touch-and-go. It was sometimes difficult to make the right diagnosis, and things went wrong if the patient's treated for something other than their affliction.

House had bitter firsthand experience of that. His own case was likely the one he mulled over the most. No one had caught it until the damage was done, and five years ago as House vehemently blamed the medley of doctors involved, he may have felt it was more his fault than anyone else's. He was supposed to be the professional, and he himself missed it too, and he had to pay the considerable price. There were other bad cases as well, with much sleep lost to solve, and people who may be eternally ungrateful; malpractice suits from people who wouldn't have been around to file a malpractice suit if it hadn't been House working on their case.

House made it seem easy, like it was all just in a day's work. By attitude, he seemed to respect hatred as an art form for he was certainly on the receiving end of it often enough. Maybe this was what Wilson 'sensed'. In fact, he was logically convinced that this was the case, and yet when he put the feeling and the explanation together, they didn't quite cancel out.

'Although I wouldn't complain if I was given two weeks off clinic duty. That's what... one sixty-eight... three hundred and thirty-six hours of General Hospital.'

'Or Cuddy could just take it out of your debt. That's about a year and a half, if you do four hours a week.'

'Exactly. _If_ I did four hours a week. If I only did two, I wouldn't have to work in the clinic for three whole years.' There was a twinkle in his eye and he threw out the second paper towel, checking with the mirror above the sink to see if he needed more.

'At the very least, go get checked out. Just humor me.' Wilson said, looking at House in the mirror. He glanced back at him, poised for some other witty retort, but kept it to himself. Maybe he sensed something about Wilson, just as Wilson did him, and he merely nodded, taking up his cane.

'But you gotta keep Cuddy off my back while I sneak away.'

Wilson gave his assurance, and followed him out. He was glad House knew when to trust him. They'd certainly known each other long enough, he couldn't see why he wouldn't, but for his general mistrust of humanity. He'd certainly hide things, and was usually somewhat flustered when Wilson's intuition tracked it down, but quickly became aloof about it, throwing in some of his questionable wit to shake the oncologist's course. He could be reasonable when he felt the need, though the intervals of it were unpredictable.

House waved his goodbye to Cuddy upon exiting, and strolled off down the hall whistling slightly off-key.

'Wha- where is he go...' She turned on Wilson. 'Is he going back to the clinic? Of free will?'

Wilson glanced indicatively at the ground. 'Getting cold down there, do you think?'

Cuddy rolled her eyes some and turned to go after House.

'Uh, Dr. Cuddy.' Wilson called after her, thinking fast about what to say to stall her. He figured the whole clinic vacation thing would be enough, if bland, and filled her in on the details.

She laughed. 'Three hundred clinic hours? Tell me he's joking.'

'You could just take it off the end. Do you really want him here until 2054?'

'Why is he only corrupting you now? One would think he'd have gotten to you sooner.'

Wilson held up his hands a little. 'Don't shoot the messenger. I'm just relaying what he said.'

'Alright, alright, but now he's alone in the clinic. Maybe he should just get some time off from the clinic. It always seems like more effort for the rest of us when he's there.' She shook her head and stalked back to the clinic.

The latter half of the day certainly seemed to be more animated than the first. Wilson mused on House's disgust at being a patient, and probably figured the five minutes he had stalled Cuddy would be enough for him to get in and out of the examination room. Knowing him, he probably performed the exam himself. Upon entering the clinic, he wasn't yet back out harassing patients.

Cuddy strode right up to the reception desk. 'Is Dr. House with a patient?' She asked impatiently.

'Not exactly...' The receptionist began...


End file.
